Swimming: Boyle caps campaign with another record

There will not be any rest for swim star Lauren Boyle after she dragged her weary body home to eighth place in the final of the 800m freestyle to complete New Zealand's campaign at the world swimming championships in Shanghai.

The 23-year-old pushed hard early on to go with the pace but faded to finish with a solid time of eight minutes 32.72 seconds, inside her former national record but slower than the new record she set in the heats.

Boyle is back into training in two days with five other members of the team - Gareth Kean, Matt Stanley, Glenn Snyders, Tash Hind and Amaka Gessler - who will stay on in China to prepare for the World University Games in three weeks.

Boyle helped the New Zealand team to their best performance in a world championships in terms of finals and semifinals contested.

They qualified for four finals and six semifinals, bettering the previous best achieved in 2007. In medal terms the three won by Danyon Loader in 1994 stand among the six world championships medals won by New Zealand swimmers.

Boyle, coached by Mark Regan, made three finals.

Individually, she made finals in the 400m and 800m freestyle and in the 4x200m freestyle relay, and was also a semifinalist in the 200m freestyle. She set new national records in all including a whopping 5s in the 800m.

Boyle had set lofty goals for yesterday's final but it proved too much for the weary swimmer.

"The championships have taken a lot out of me," she said.

"I've never raced at this intensity and competed in so many heats, semifinals and finals and right now I am absolutely exhausted.

"I pushed out harder to give myself a chance and then I couldn't pull it together in the end.

"But I'm not beating myself up about it though. I gave it all I could."

Earlier, backstroker Daniel Bell could not advance in the heats of the 50m backstroke, finishing 22nd fastest in 25.91s.

The women's 800m freestyle was won by Rebecca Adlington (Britain) in 8:17.51, second Lotte Friis (Norway) 8:18.20 and third Kate Ziegler (US) 8:23.36.

- NZPA